A study by a leading Alzheimer's researcher at the University of Kentucky Sanders-Brown Center on Aging provides new evidence that will help researchers home in on the molecular mechanisms involved in inflammation of the central nervous system (CNS) and aid drug-development strategies for treating inflammatory neurological diseases.

Older adults who have spoken two languages since childhood are faster than single-language speakers at switching from one task to another, according to a study conducted at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine.

The research was led by Brian Gold, associate professor of anatomy and neurobiology and Sanders-Brown faculty associate, who specializes in cognitive neuroscience. The article, "Lifelong Bilingualism Maintains Neural Efficiency for Cognitive Control in Aging," was published in the Jan. 9 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience.

A research team composed of University of Kentucky researchers has published a paper which provides the first direct evidence that activated astrocytes could play a harmful role in Alzheimer's disease. The UK Sanders-Brown Center on Aging has also received significant new National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding to further this line of study.

UK Chemistry professor Allan Butterfield was recently announced as the newest Fellow of the Society for Free Radical Biology and Medicine (SFRBM ) at the 19th Annual Meeting of SFRBM in San Diego. Butterfield is the UK Alumni Association Endowed Professor of Biological Chemistry; director of the UK Center of Membrane Sciences; director of Free Radical Biology in the Cancer Shared Resource Facility of the UK Markey Cancer Center; and a faculty member of the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging. His election as SFRBM Fellow was based on his outstanding contributions to the field of free radical chemistry, redox biology and antioxidants.

Linda J. Van Eldik is at the forefront of the crusade to help a growing population of older adults age in healthy ways. She helms the University of Kentucky Sanders-Brown Center on Aging (SBCoA), home to the federally-funded UK Alzheimer's Disease Center (ADC).